Digging Up Dead Kids (*may trigger*)

There is a slideshow over on Yahell this morning featuring a place that I've read about:  The Arthur G. Dozier School for Boys in Marianna, Florida.  People are digging for the remains of boys that died there and were buried there.  Here is the link to the story:  http://news.yahoo.com/photos/remains-at-ex-florida-reform-school-1378296422-slideshow/ .

The more boring a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the child, receive adulation for being good parents-- because they have a tame child-creature in their house.  ~~  Frank Zappa


I've read Roger Dean Kiser's books.  The first one I read was titled The White House Boys.  It was pretty difficult stuff.  Up through 1968, the boys were separated into "whites" and "coloreds."  Kiser says the black kids were treated even worse.  The White House refers to a building where the boys were forced to lay face down on an old stained mattress and beaten [note: not "spanked," as that is a far too sanitized word for what happened over there] for such infractions as smoking, uttering a curse word after falling and injuring himself, or attempting escape.  Kiser described underwear having to be picked out from the boys' buttocks afterwards, a lot of blood, and welts.  Boys were sent there for such "crimes" as running away from home, truancy, or having nowhere else to go through no fault of their own.

The more boring a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the child, receive adulation for being good parents-- because they have a tame child-creature in their house.  ~~  Frank Zappa


Four survivors of the place came forward initially.  Kiser was one of them.  Then more came.  The White House was sealed in a nifty little ceremony.  Today the school is closed and bodies are being dug up at the cemetery on the school grounds.

The more boring a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the child, receive adulation for being good parents-- because they have a tame child-creature in their house.  ~~  Frank Zappa


The comments on the slideshow are interesting, ranging from "I was there" to "Nothing happened there get over it folks" to "Those kids deserved it" to "Kids today need to be physically disciplined."  And perhaps a bit more by now.

The more boring a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the child, receive adulation for being good parents-- because they have a tame child-creature in their house.  ~~  Frank Zappa

http://www.teenadvocatesusa.org/

We who are so advanced and so civilized and so committed to our various and sundry religions and quasi-religions sit around congratulating ourselves.  Now those kids will get to be buried in family plots.  We don't do this sort of thing anymore.  Once in awhile, a kid needed a couple of stitches after a session at The White House.  No big deal.  Nothing much happened there.  Some of us were helped by the corporeal punishment.  Pour me another one.

 The more boring a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the child, receive adulation for being good parents-- because they have a tame child-creature in their house.  ~~  Frank Zappa

http://wwaspsurvivors.com/youth-foundation-success-academy-youth-foundation-inc/

This sort of thing does happen today.  Oh, not the clandestine graves off in the woods or on a hill somewhere perhaps.  There are kids-- so-called "troubled teens"-- stuck in places which will turn them into tractable robots because of alleged or real drug experimentation, addiction issues, dysfunctional homes, cursing, acting out, difficulties in school and more.  A teen can be sent away today for a price.  A handsome sum of money will get your teen a sub-standard academic education, little to no medical treatment or dentistry, exposure to cult-like seminars, time in isolation rooms like The Hobbit.  A bit more money and you don't even have to take your teen there.  People will show up at your home and remove your teen to such a place.  Congratulations.  If your teen survives the experience somewhat intact, your problems will be solved.

The more boring a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the child, receive adulation for being good parents-- because they have a tame child-creature in their house.  ~~  Frank Zappa

http://wwaspsurvivors.com/new-york-times-students-recall-special-schools-run-like-prisons/

You will be informed by the administration that your "troubled teen" will lie to you about conditions at the ahem, residential school.  He or she will lie to you about mistreatment there.  Don't worry.  It's a phase they all go through in order to manipulate you into pulling them out of there and taking them home.  Your telephone conversations with your teen will be monitored by staff.  The letters you receive from your teen will be censored and re-written until they are up to specs.  It's all good.

The more boring a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the child, receive adulation for being good parents-- because they have a tame child-creature in their house.  ~~  Frank Zappa

http://wwaspsurvivors.com/another-lawsuit-filed-against-cross-creek-manor/

At the seminars that you and your teen are present at, your teen will willingly "confess" to consuming large quantities of drugs, selling drugs, sleeping around.  You knew the problem was "bad" but you had no idea.  Your teen didn't have any idea either.  If your teen had been raped, she [I could not find any stories of this being done to males there] will have been made to confess to her slutty and whorish behaviors.  Because everybody knows that people who are rape survivors placed a part in their own sexual assaults.

The more boring a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the child, receive adulation for being good parents-- because they have a tame child-creature in their house.  ~~  Frank Zappa

http://wwaspsurvivors.com/youth-foundation-success-academy-youth-supervisor-charged-for-showing-porn-to-students/

You are glad that the ahem, educational consultant helped you find this wonderful Youth Foundation [or whatever WWASPS' current entity name is] or other such agency.  You are doing the ultimate.  You are engaged in "saving your troubled teen's life."  There was nothing else you could do.  And now, your wonder boy or wonder girls is returning to the fold.  Your "troubled teen" is respectful.  Wow.  He or she even asks permission to go to the bathroom.

The more boring a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the child, receive adulation for being good parents-- because they have a tame child-creature in their house.  ~~  Frank Zappa

http://wwaspsurvivors.com/

Or, maybe your "troubled teen" wasn't so lucky.  Maybe your "troubled teen" got raped, beaten, thrown into isolation for days, weeks, months at a time.  Maybe your "troubled teen" came home broken, is still in treatment for the stuff that happened at that darling ahem residential school, has nightmares, had a psychotic break, can barely function.  Or maybe your "troubled teen" didn't survive the treatment that was supposed to fix him or her.  Dead kids don't talk back.

The more boring a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the child, receive adulation for being good parents-- because they have a tame child-creature in their house.  ~~  Frank Zappa

http://wwaspsurvivors.com/the-troubled-teen-industry/

Or maybe you pulled your "troubled teen" out of the ahem, residential treatment place/school because something wasn't right.  Maybe you've apologized.  Maybe you are all endeavoring to learn how to "be."  Maybe you all will succeed on some level and maybe you won't.  Your "troubled teen" is shell-shocked.  But at least your "troubled teen" is not dead.

The more boring a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the child, receive adulation for being good parents-- because they have a tame child-creature in their house.  ~~  Frank Zappa

http://wwaspsurvivors.com/documentary-locked-in-paradise/

Those "troubled teens" who remain un-brainwashed after their tortured existence at one of those places is spending time on the web at survivor sites, has met or re-connected with others who also remain un-brainwashed, has become Anonymous and is working on something called OpLiberation, is writing or has written poetry or essays or a book, makes art, is now some sort of public speaker and activist.  And you don't know what happened to make him or her turn out this way.  After all, the ahem residential school promised you a tractable teen.  What you have here in your home now is an angry young adult.  You don't understand that your angry young adult is engaged in a process of liberation.  You are dumbfounded as your angry young adult moves out, moves on, moves away.

The more boring a child is, the more the parents, when showing off the child, receive adulation for being good parents-- because they have a tame child-creature in their house.  ~~  Frank Zappa

 
In sadness and in solidarity,
radical sapphoq


references regarding The Arthur G. Dozier School for Boys:

http://global.christianpost.com/news/arthur-g-dozier-school-for-boys-killed-nearly-100-youth-remains-excavated-on-school-grounds-103552/

http://www.examiner.com/article/horrors-at-arthur-g-dozier-school-for-boys-victims-speak-out

http://thewhitehouseboys.com/abusereport.pdf

http://thewhitehouseboys.blogspot.com/

http://justin-caldwell.blogspot.com/

http://thewhitehouseboysonline.com/

http://www.thewhitehouseboysblog.com/index.html

 

Teachers Arrested in China

Two teachers were arrested in China in October of 2012.  Their crimes? Abusing kids in the classroom.  The incidents led to an outcry among people who use the Chinese micro-blogging service called Weibo.  They saw the first picture of a teacher pulling on a young boy's ears, uncovered personal details and more pictures of kids in her classroom being abused on her micro-blog, and agitated for her arrest.  A second teacher in a different province was also fired for abusing kids in her classroom.  The Chinese users of Weibo spoke up loudly and clearly. 

Meanwhile, here in the United States we continue to send our teens off to dangerous troubled teen industry facilities with documented histories of abuse, torture, rape, and death.  How barbaric!  There are many pictures and videos on the internet for our perusal. There are survivor testimonies, reddits, forums.  There are web pages set up as memorials to the kids who went off to these places-- boot camps, religious boarding "schools," behavioral modification facilities, wilderness expeditions et. al.-- and didn't return alive.  Yet, we cannot or will not educate ourselves.  We have self-designated teen behavioral experts, talk show hosts, and educational consultants advising us to ship our teens out to these disgusting places.  We have learned nothing.  We have become immune to horror.  The many pictures and videos ready and available for our immediate consumption clearly illustrate that this abuse exists.  Where is the public outcry?  Our "experts" and teen seminar leaders tell us that the kids are troubled, manipulative, liars.  Workers on staff in the troubled teen institutions routinely advise parents that their teens will complain and to discount anything that the teen tells them.  

Teens get sent off to these places and then discover that there is no way to contact their parents by phone or letter without direct staff oversight.  There is no way to contact a state official to complain about mistreatment.  [N.B.  And religious schools operate extralegally].  There is little if any contact with the outside world.  The kids are isolated.  Sometimes they are told that sleep and food are not rights.  Sometimes they are not allowed to communicate with other teens around them.  Sometimes they are placed in isolation rooms for weeks or months.  Sometimes they are forcibly given powerful drugs.  Sometimes they are raped, beaten, mocked.  Sometimes face-plant restraints are used on them.  Sometimes their medical complaints are ignored or discounted.  Sometimes they die.

And yet, the unknowing and willfully ignorant American public rally around strangers who claim to be able to get through to our teens.  We sign away our parental rights, allow teens to be forcibly removed from our homes, turn them over to places sight unseen that claim to treat a variety of teen ills.  Yeah, there is something wrong with this picture.

radical sapphoq says:  Wake up.  Parenting is your job and your responsibility.  Before signing up your child for any program or service, get informed about the pros and cons.  Type the name of the place that you are considering sending your kid to followed by the word "survivors," "abuse," "lawsuit," or "critics."  Investigate the alternatives.  Know your options.  Underneath the shiny suits and self-assured sales pitches may be people who are interested in your wallet.  Some people out there are sick, much sicker than your rebellious teen.  Some people are slimy.  The agendas of the troubled teen industry may not match your own.  Not everyone wishes us well.  Not everyone has our best interests or the best interests of our teens at heart.  Politicians can be bought.  Politicians may share a religious ideology with a popular teen "expert" or with those who are running a particular troubled teen service.  These are uncomfortable truths that I and others have written about.  You ignore them at your peril and at the peril of your "troubled" teen.



http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2012/10/26/chinese-teacher-student-ears-weibo/ 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2223120/Unspeakable-cruelty-Picture-emerges-Chinese-teacher-holding-screaming-pupil-ground-EARS.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

http://horrorfiles.nodeju.com/420/chinese-teacher-fired-for-child-brutality.html

http://micgadget.com/31173/its-outrageous-to-see-how-unqualified-chinese-teachers-abuse-kindergarten-kids-video/

http://www.inquisitr.com/375476/teacher-fired-after-posting-photos-of-child-abuse-photos/ 


http://www.heal-online.org/childtortureusa.htm

http://www.momlogic.com/2009/0/are_troubled_teens_tortured.php

http://teentroublejoshshipp.com/

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xfelz5_liberez-la-bete_music#.UR7118bhfAZ

http://troubledteenindustry.com/video

http://www.helpsavetroubledteens.com/  [note: slide show toward the bottom right] 

http://www.momlogic.com/2009/0/are_troubled_teens_tortured.php

http://atheism.about.com/b/2011/10/20/religious-schools-for-troubled-teens-use-abuse-torture.htm

http://formerhephzibahgirls.webs.com/

http://crosscreek.wwaspsn.org/

http://www.nypost.com/p/entertainment/tv/reality_show_told_school_stop_sending_eXSiyTY2aAh4J3Kpn3VvDM

 

An Interview

My friend Ann currently works in a rehabilitation center that uses behavior modification to help teens that are out of control and unable to function in their communities safely.  She readily agreed to the interview to give an example of how a treatment facility works that respects the rights of teens.




Did you have to go through a background check before working at your facility?

Yes of course.  We all do.  Every new hire does.  We are fingerprinted, background checked, bonded.  The whole deal.



What are the criterion for a teen to get into the center where you work?

In order to get into our facility, a teen has to have a history of violence or are out of control mentally and in need of anti-psychotic medication.

When a teen comes in off of their medication, how is that?

A kid off their meds-- when they come in they are high off of street drugs, dirty, inappropriate attire-- they dress like hookers-- with various untreated S.T.D.s, head lice, scabies, pregnant, malnourished.



As part of your current job duties, do you have to restrain teens?

Yes.

How does that go?  What is the process?

When a teen is for instance attempting to choke a staff member.  The kids being restrained are violent, out of control, a danger to themselves and others.  These teens have severely hurt staff people:  blindness, broken bones, compound fractures, stab wounds, murder, bleach thrown on staff, attempts to set staff on fire, held hostage, had family members go after staff family members.  It is really important that the restraint be carried out successfully.

 Those things have happened to staff members.  So take downs and restraints are something that has to be done for the safety of the out of control teen, their peers, and the staff members.

Once the teen shows signs of de-escalating, then we are able to help them by talking them down and then gradually let them up.

Restraints are not done to punish the kids.  They are done to take control of the kids so that they don't harm themselves or others.  Our kids are capable of hurting themselves and others.  They have done so.  A restraint hopefully prevents injuries to the teens and to the staff.

You've said that there is a de-escalation process?

You can feel in the kid's body that they are not fighting you-- they've stopped fighting you-- and their levels go down.  Once they've started relaxing into the restraint, you give them simple directions.  Like, "I'm going to release you.  You are going to sit up.  I'm going to help you sit up.  You will keep your hands on your knees.  If you don't keep your hands on your knees, you will go back down on the floor."  

I may give them written assignments to do afterwards.  They are put on a program separate from the other teens.  They are given packets to do that addresses their issue.  They are made aware of their other choices through problem solving with the staff that they had the issue with as long as both parties are willing.

If a teen cooperates, does the packets, is willing to talk through their behavior the process will take maybe a couple of hours.  If they are not cooperative, the process can take days--

More than a week?

Yes, more than a week--

More than a month?

Sometimes more than a week but not a month.  They are motivated to cooperate because they want to be back with their peers, doing the regular schedule.

Are they put in a room by themselves during that time?  In isolation?

No.  They are kept in an area with the other kids but they are on their own program.  They  are not allowed to talk with the other kids during day program time.  We want their attention to be on their behavior and what they could have done different.  This is not done to punish them.  It is done to further their rehabilitation.

During this time, are they allowed to receive mail?  Visits?

If they have assaulted someone and get arrested, then it is out of our hands and they go to the county lock-up and have to answer in court.  If they are in the treatment center with us-- not arrested-- they are allowed to receive and send mail.  A worker is present during a supervised visit to discuss what happened.  The teen, their family, and a worker discuss together what happened during the incident leading up to the restraint.

Anything else?

A teen may lose some privileges-- an hour of their television time, no playing cards with the other teens for a set amount of time, no off campus trips until the teen can show us that they are keeping their behavior under better control.  Keeping a teen back from trips is not really a punishment.  It is a safety and security issue.  If your child was out of control, would you take them to the grocery store?  If a kid attacks you with a pencil, would you allow them to have another pencil because they are calm for the moment?



So what is the regular program like?

Education.  The kids have teachers and classrooms.  They can study for G.E.D.s or go to college on-line or in the community.

The classroom teachers are required to be licensed and they are trained by necessity to do restraints.  The teachers instruct the teens in small groups of ten kids.  There are computer classes to learn how to use one, vocational classes, and self-contained classes for the kids with special needs.

Besides education, there are arts and crafts, drugs and alcohol, behavioral groups, life skills group, and individual counseling with a Master's level therapist.  The kids are expected to do chores routinely as a way to learn responsibility and team work.  They can get a paid assistant or kitchen job for exemplary behavior-- and those jobs pay minimum wage.



What is the food like?

The food is quite good.  The kids meet once a month.  They can make complaints or tell what food they've liked.  We had an upgrade in food about five years ago as a result of the meetings with the kids.  The kids have snacks too.

Are they ever forced to eat?

No.  That is not allowed.



What happens when a kid gets sick or says they are sick?

All staff are trained in First Aid.  Choking.  Blood contact.  There are nurses and a physician assistant or a nurse practitioner  present on campus twenty-four hours.  Kids are evaluated by the medical staff and are taken to the emergency room via ambulance if the medical staff say so.  The med staff have to err on the side of caution.  

Some kids do fake sickness and injuries.  But they are sent to e.r. on the basis of observable symptoms and on the symptoms they report, even if they are suspected of faking.  

Kids ever fake or show symptoms of asthma attacks?

Medical staff are called immediately if a kid has an asthma attack.  Medical staff are called immediately even when we know that a kid is faking.  Because the sickness or injury that we ignore can very well turn out to be the real deal.  We have to assume that the injury or illness is real every time.



Is a teen allowed to use the phone if they want to report being mistreated?

Kids are given access to a phone and privacy to call an ombudsman who looks out for their rights.  Anytime they ask for the phone to do that, they are immediately given access to one.

We are required to do that.  Some kids play on that, they make false reports.  But others have turned in reports of staff having sex with the kids or bringing in alcohol for the kids that are accurate.


Every report is looked at as being founded until proven otherwise.  The accused staff gets moved around, away from the kids until the complaint is unsubstantiated.  Staff have complained about this as being unfair, because it is our lives being disrupted by a false report.  Staff are moved into jobs away from the kids during the investigation.

The reports that are substantiated-- staff have been fired, arrested, dealt with in criminal court.



Anything else you want to add?

 Locked facilities like ours are necessary.  By the time a teen gets to us, there are no other options left except for the prison system. They cannot live safely with their families in their communities.  The teens that I work with are not kids who experiment with pot or cut school or talk back to a parent once in awhile.  The teens at our facility are dangerous.  We are not allowed to humiliate or verbally or physically abuse the teens in our care in any way.  Some teens do go on to commit violent crimes after release and go through the adult prison system.  I have seen some teens having success after release.  

Like the girl we ran into last summer at her job.  I remember how happy you both were to see each other.


Yes, you would not have recognized her when she first came in.  That makes my job worth it.